When I joined Streetline almost 2 1/2 years ago there were three macro trends that drove my decision. First, was a strong belief that I wanted to find an industry that was relatively untouched by new technology and one where there was a real problem to be solved that could impact the lives of millions – I choose to engage in the smart city / smart parking industry. Second, it was painfully clear that mobile technology and applications were going to be pervasive and become the primary way we engaged with the internet. The final bet was on the “internet of things” – the belief that sensors were getting good enough and cheap enough to fundamentally alter the way we interacted with our physical environment. Over the last 2 1/2 years I have learnt a lot about how to actually make the internet of things a reality – how do we you create a full technology stack from the sensors and the hardware all the way to the consumer and enterprise applications that can actually take advantage of this new data and information. This is not an easy task, but the results I believe will do nothing short of change how we all live and work.

Much has been written about the internet of things recently, but over the last 2 weeks there have been 2 specific announcements that I think will in retrospect be viewed as a tipping point. The first was a report issued by GE titled “The Industrial Internet: Pushing the Boundaries of Minds and Machines” . The first couple of lines in the executive summary says it all “The world is on the threshold of a new era of innovation and change with the rise of the Industrial Internet. It is taking place through the convergence of the global industrial system with the power of advanced computing, analytics, low-cost sensing and new levels of connectivity permitted by the Internet.” GE goes on to describe what in their view are the 3 major periods of innovation in our history : The Industrial Revolution, The Internet Revolution and now the Industrial Internet. GE believe that the Industrial Internet will add $10-15 trillion to global GDP. This is a grand statement by a world class company that can actually influence the evolution of the internet of things.

Of course there are other major companies that see this future and are positioning their companies for success – IBM has for several years driven its “Smarter Planet” strategy that also has at its heart the analytics that use all this device data to drive greater insight. (disclosure again – IBM is a strategic Streetline partner).

So in my mind there is no doubt that the internet of things will have a profound impact on our lives, our cities, our companies and our planet. This is not a future vision thing – this is happening now !

To all the VC’s out there that in the past have been hesitant to fund start-ups that had a hardware component, I would encourage them to revisit this traditional hypothesis – as you can imagine it is tough to have an internet of things “without things” . The value creation opportunity for start-up in this space is immense – but you need to make sure the solution solves a real world problem.

To aspiring entrepreneurs I would encourage you to be bold and to explore the many aspects of daily life where new data from objects connected to the internet can enhance our experience. For companies, the revenue and cost saving implications are massive (the GE report has some great examples) so see how connecting what you build (eg. printers, cars, planes, ovens, thermostats etc.) to the internet can change the service and value proposition of what you provide.

But what else ? There are such a broad set of opportunities to be captured. So again, here is my question for all of you – if you were starting a new company today in the broader realm of the “internet of things” what would you do. As always welcome the feedback and input.